Parliament in a Funk

In the Great Hall of the People, beside Tiananmen Square, the National People’s Congress opened its annual session this week, giving foreign reporters the opportunity to dust off that hoariest of chestnuts, “the rubber-stamp parliament,” to describe the affair. The Chinese state press, of course, prefers a more vigorous image, as in the China Daily, which warned the other day that “Land Transfer May Draw ‘Heated Debate.’” So, which is it? A choreographed pageant or an improving experiment in democracy?

In fairness, the National People’s Congress is not the political equivalent of professional wrestling. When the three thousand delegates gather each spring, there is real debate and disagreement over policy. The best example came three years ago when a proposed property law was withdrawn at the last minute from the legislative agenda because leftist Party hardliners had mounted a closed-door rebellion against what they considered an ideological betrayal. In the end, that discord was not a victory for democracy: opponents were silenced, Chinese media was blocked from reporting it, and the measure passed without incident a year later. But it was the first debate of its kind in a decade and a surprising measure of the N.P.C.’s evolution since its somnambulant days in the early nineteen-nineties. (For the record, delegates are permitted to vote No, usually to express displeasure with corruption or incompetence. A couple of years ago, for instance, more than ten per cent of the delegates voted against an annual court report, and nearly as many voted against the national budget.)

So, if it’s not professional wrestling, then the parliament is more akin to a fencing match: some drama, some fancy outfits, but nobody draws blood. Moreover, things are going to be especially sedate this year because the Party is worried that concern over unemployment and economic crisis could push delegates to step out of bounds. (It was not a good sign when leaders announced that the congress would be shortened to nine days this year, as a cost saver.) In that gloomy atmosphere, the real action is happening on the sidelines: some Party leaders are said to be privately complaining about Premier Wen Jiabao’s handling of the economy, and the Timesreports that a group of liberal Communist Party elders has sent a letter to President Hu Jintao arguing that the economic crisis is not a time to stall democratic reform, but to speed it up. The chief author of the letter is Li Rui, the ninety-one-year-old former secretary to Chairman Mao. As Li and others urged Hu, “The greater the difficulties, the greater the need for democracy.”

Evan Osnos joined The New Yorker as a staff writer in 2008, and covers politics and foreign affairs.